János Áder is one of our regime-changing politicians. He already participated in the 1987 housing meeting and the 1989 opposition round table negotiations.
He played an important role in the series of negotiations that dismantled state socialism, and the development of the democratic election system after 1990 can also be linked to his name.
Pope Francis meeting with President János Áder, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Deputy Prime Minister Zsolt Semjén before the closing mass of the 52nd International Eucharistic Congress at the Museum of Fine Arts on September 12, 2021 (Photo: MTI/Prime Minister/Gergely Botár)
In the first free parliamentary election following the system change, in 1990, he received a parliamentary mandate as a representative of Fidesz. Later, his hometown of Csorna sent him to the House of Commons as an individual member of parliament elected three times.
In 1998, he was elected president of the parliament, a position he held until 2002.
With his activities as Speaker of the House, he also strengthened the esteem of our country on the international stage.
During this period, we joined the NATO defense alliance.
In 2009, he was elected a member of the European Parliament. He worked as an EU representative and vice-chairman of the European Parliament's Environment, Public Health and Food Safety Committee.
At the end of April 2012, he became the head of state candidate with 262 recommendations from the Fidesz-KDNP faction alliance. On May 2, the Parliament elected him president of the republic with two-thirds support, 262 votes, in the first round.
On September 26, 2012, the observer mission of the Holy See delegated to the UN awarded him the Road to Peace award.
President János Áder will speak at the online summit meeting of the heads of state of the Bucharest Nine (B9), which brings together Central and Eastern European NATO member states, on May 10, 2021 (Photo: MTI/Noémi Bruzák)
As head of state, János Áder emphatically fought for the cause of environmental protection in both of his elected terms.
To this end, in 2015 he set up the Environmental Sustainability Directorate in the Office of the President of the Republic, and in 2016 he established the Blue Planet Climate Protection Foundation.
On May 8, 2017, he took the presidential oath of his second term in the Parliament. In his speech, he urged compromise and deplored the dramatic decline in the standard of public discourse.
In May 2021, he and his wife established the István Regőczi Foundation in order to help children left orphaned or semi-orphaned as a result of the coronavirus epidemic.
János Áder's last speech as head of state was at the inaugural session of the new Parliament on May 2.
In an interview published in Magyar Nemzet, the outgoing President of the Republic said - looking back on his work over the past ten years - that he is leaving the Sándor Palace with a calm heart, as he has fulfilled his main commitments.
The president of the republic, elected in 2012, undertook to represent Hungarian interests and values.
He explained: a politician must pay attention to whether the decision he has made is humanly, morally and legally correct, János Áder added.
He said: in the past ten years, he has visited every mission in which a significant number of Hungarian soldiers served. The largest and most memorable of these was in Afghanistan. He recalled that the visit took place before Christmas, when he cooked almost 120 liters of fish soup for soldiers serving abroad.
The President of the Republic met Pope Francis five times. He said: for the first visit, he brought the Holy Father a bottle of water from one of the best-known Hungarian springs.
János Áder also spoke about his future plans. He said he wanted to deal with his two foundations. The István Regőczi Foundation does not simply provide assistance to children and young people orphaned as a result of the coronavirus epidemic, but also supports them until they obtain a diploma or a profession.
The Kék Bolygó Foundation, which supports start-ups, is similarly important to him. The development ideas include, for example, the processing of plastic waste, the recycling of rubber, the modernization of irrigation technologies, and the protection of the land's productivity. János Áder continues his environmental podcast, in which he talks to his guests about climate and environmental protection.
If we include the temporary presidents of the republic, then János Áder is our seventh head of state after the regime change. However, if we expand the picture and list all our heads of state without the crowned kings, we find that János Áder was the twenty-seventh to hold office. The list is opened by Lajos Kossuth, who was the governor-president of our country from April 14 to August 11, 1849, and immediately after him comes Artúr Görgey, who held the highest public-law dignity for the shortest period of time, who left this position two days later, on August 13 .
Our third head of state, following him in chronological order, did not hold this office for much longer either, as Archduke József Habsburg served as homo regius, that is, as the king's plenipotentiary deputy, from November 13 to 16, 1918, until the outbreak of the Autumn Rose Revolution and the election of Mihály Károlyi as president. at the head. At the other end of the line is Miklós Horthy, who took office on March 1, 1920, which he held until October 16, 1944. Pál Losonczi, who was already at the head of the Hungarian People's Republic, from April 14, 1967 to June 25, 1987, can claim a measurable amount of time for this. In third place on the podium is István Dobi, who held office from August 14, 1952 to April 14, 1967.
János Áder was elected President of the Republic by the Parliament on May 2, 2012. He was elected President of the Republic for the second time on March 13, 2017, so in these two terms he was Hungary's highest public dignitary for a total of ten years.
In our opening photo, President János Áder at the press conference held after the meeting of the Water and Climate Leadership Council at the UN headquarters in Geneva on March 8, 2022 (Photo: MTI/Noémi Bruzák)
Source: hirado.hu
